Julie Arthur

CONTACT:
Email: jmpoet78@gmail.com                

BIO:
Julie Arthur is a Midwestern poet with a restless soul. She writes in the in-between places: between errands and sunsets, between fleeting thoughts and the slow turning of seasons. Her work lingers where the personal meets the communal, capturing both the tremors of current events and the daily, tender currents of motherhood. Ideas find her in the quiet cracks of the day, and she follows them, trusting in their power to reflect our lives and stitch together the spaces between us.

She is currently writing her second collection, Unmerited Gifts, a thoughtful exploration of grief and the unexpected grace that rises from its center.

PUBLICATIONS:
Mother Verses: Poems (2025): https://books.by/caught-on-paper

Poetry

The Trees

I took a nap today,
To save myself from my thoughts.
From watching the news,
Drowning in noise that doesn’t belong to me.
I walked through the neighborhoods
Around my house, and yours.
My kindness patrol, if you will.
To check on my fellow humans,
Weathering, just like me.
Smiles are easier to give
Then rhetoric,
But sometimes it feels like some
Would rather throw the latter around
Like confetti, to see where it sticks.
I light a candle on my kitchen windowsill
Each morning and whisper a word for the day.
Today’s word was “friendship.”
I don’t know what tomorrow will necessitate.
It’s February and I’m mostly
Inside in this weather, but the trees,
The trees are still out there,
Saving the world.

Layers

Let yourself show up in layers
To this life, she whispered to me.
There isn’t a formula,
A fix, for there is nothing 
Fundamentally wrong with any of us
Who are born from stardust,
Who will return to it again someday.
It’s this beautiful exhale of a life- 
The in between time,
That’s got us all so captivated.
The punches of light,
A cackle of laughter that hurts your side,
Heaving sobs of pain,
A smitten smile of new love.
The layers of this gift each of us has been given
To unwrap a little more with 
Each passing day.
If we lived in reverse,
From end to beginning,
Oh, how delirious the moments would be,
Dripping in the sweet agony
Of glory, nostalgia, and regret all in the same,
The countdown from end until we are first named.
First breath taken; the cry.
It would be recognized so much more
For what it truly is, no?
A cry of longing for it not to be over so soon.